


gift fic!! for friend!!!!

by taylor_tut



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Gen, Hurt Martin Blackwood, Hurt/Comfort, Injury, Minor Injuries, Sick Character, Sick Jonathan "Jon" Sims | The Archivist, Sickfic, Withdrawal
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-26
Updated: 2020-09-26
Packaged: 2021-03-08 01:07:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,759
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26657131
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/taylor_tut/pseuds/taylor_tut
Summary: This is a gift for a friend! They didn't ask for it but I wrote it anyway! Basically, while they're leaving the safehosue, Jon is withdrawing from the statements, and Martin falls and injures his ankle. Jon tries to support Martin while they push forward, but when he collapses, they decide to turn back, which is hardly any easier. :)
Relationships: Martin Blackwood/Jonathan "Jon" Sims | The Archivist
Comments: 9
Kudos: 168





	gift fic!! for friend!!!!

**Author's Note:**

  * For [celosiaa](https://archiveofourown.org/users/celosiaa/gifts).



When they leave the safehouse, Jon isn’t entirely sure if he’s withdrawing, starving, or just plain ill, and he doesn’t have the energy to care. He’d told Martin some of it: the headaches, the nausea, the chills--but he just worries so much, and Jon feels guilty to make him, so in the more recent days, he’s been… well, he wouldn’t call it lying. Martin might, but Jon wouldn’t. It’s just… focusing on the positives, trying not to dwell. Jon is aware of his tendency to brood, so he’s been trying to make sure he’s not making it worse for himself by thinking about the way his brain feels as if it’s trying to escape through his eyes, the way his skin crawls with a perceived cold, the way his stomach churns when he so much as thinks about trying to eat anything. 

“Jon, love, are you ready?” Martin calls, snapping him out of his thoughts. Jon nods, though it’s disingenuous. Truly, he’s not entirely sure how long he’ll be able to make it on his feet before he needs to rest again, but they can’t stay in the safehouse forever, so he perks himself up. 

“Yes, almost. Are you?” 

“Mhm,” Martin hums, “ready as I’ll be, I suppose. How’s the headache? You seem tired.” 

“Not gone,” he downplays, because he’s certain he doesn’t have it in him to convince Martin that he’s feeling 100%, “but it probably won’t be until we get back to the Institute.” 

Martin frowns. “But you’re—”

“I’m well enough to go,” he promises. 

“Well, if you need breaks, let me know.”

“Of course. Same applies to you.” 

“I will.” Jon shrugs on his backpack and takes one last look around the safehouse before meeting Martin at the door, where he sticks out a hand. 

It does make him feel a bit better.

They walk. For all of Beholding’s perks, if Jon can even call unwanted immortality a perk, he really can’t think of a pre-Eye time that he’s felt this awful. His joints hurt. The worm scars hurt. His  _ head _ hurts, so badly that it’s difficult to even properly focus on what Martin is saying. 

He wishes he could--Martin’s tone is jovial, light, warm, and he knows it’d make him feel better if he could just tune out the static and hear him. 

Every so often he squeezes Martin’s hand. Jon doesn’t have to Know to know that Martin’s anxious and that he’s the cause. And there’s possibly good reason for it, too--they’ve only been walking for about an hour, and Jon feels spent. Exhaustion clouds his mind and thoughts are slow, like they’re bubbling up from a pool of thick syrup. His jaw is beginning to hurt from how tightly he’s gritting his teeth to keep them from chattering. 

It would be easier to just tell Martin. If he just says something, then Martin will enforce a rest, one which might lessen the throbbing of his legs and back. Martin would give him his jumper, which will be too large and warm from his body heat, to combat the chills. He’d probably press his hand to Jon’s forehead and fuss even if he isn’t feverish, though the Knowing is whispering numbers to him which, if they’re temperatures, are becoming frighteningly high. 

A surprised yelp from Martin startles him from his thoughts, and he curses himself for not paying more attention when Martin’s hand is torn from his grip as he tumbles down a long, steep hill. It appears to happen in slow motion, though that’s probably the fear, and when Martin finally gets to the bottom, he doesn’t get up immediately. 

“Martin!” Jon cries out, willing his own balance to steady for long enough to get down the hill without falling on top of him. “Don’t move. I’m coming to you.” 

Martin groans in response, pained, but not agonized. Jon hurries. 

The adrenaline sees him to the bottom of the hill without incident, though he can feel his heart hammering in his chest from both fear and the exertion which is amplified by illness. When he gets to Martin, who has, predictably disobediently, sat up by himself, he kneels beside him. 

“Martin, are you alright? What hurts?” he asks, trying to keep the desperate sound of catching his breath out of his tone. 

Martin nods. “I’m fine,” he snaps slightly, “just my--my leg. The left one.” 

“May I take a look?” Jon asks, rolling up the trouser leg when Martin nods. He lets out the breath he’d been holding when he finds no evidence of serious injury like a bad break or dislocation, but in his worry, he can’t stop Beholding from telling him that he’s fractured the ankle quite badly, and that’s not even mentioning the road rash from the grass and rocks, which is filthy and bleeding. “It’s fractured,” he announces, “and it needs to be cleaned up.” 

Martin rolls his eyes, a bit short from the pain. “Well, we can’t very well do that here.”

“I’d… I think I’d like to take you back to the safehouse,” Jon says, “if you’d be alright with that. We haven’t been…” He trails off, finding it difficult to keep his thoughts straight, before shaking his head to clear it. “Er, sorry. We haven’t been walking for long, and we’d be able to tend it there.” 

Martin’s eyes narrow in confusion and concern. “Are you alright?” he verifies, and Jon forces a smile. 

“Don’t worry about me right now,” he dodges in a way that he hopes reads as a convincing reassurance. “I’m just worried about you.” 

“Well… you’re right: it might make more sense to get to the safehouse to recover. But are you sure we’ve got time?”

Jon can’t transform the instinctive, honest scowl. “We’ve got nothing but time,” he says. “Not as if the apocalypse is going anywhere, right?” 

Martin chuckles softly. “No, I suppose not.” 

Even if Jon were well, supporting Martin would be difficult. For starters, Jon is a hell of a lot shorter than Martin is, and his thin, small-boned frame gives Martin very little to lean on. Martin doesn’t complain, of course, even though Jon knows his bony shoulders can’t be comfortable, digging into the underside of his arm as they are. 

And the pace is agonizing. He’s trying to walk as quickly as he can, but even before this, he’d been struggling to keep up, so now that he’s half-carrying his boyfriend--well. They may have only walked an hour in this direction, but it’s certainly going to be more than an hour’s trip back to the safehouse. 

“I’m so sorry about this,” Martin says, and Jon almost stops in his tracks.

“Sorry?” he asks. “For what?” 

“For--well, for falling. For the trouble.”

Jon laughs lightly. “You didn’t do it on purpose.”

“I know that,” Martin agrees, not sounding at all soothed, “but still.”

“Still…?”

“Still, it’s a pain. A waste of time.” 

“Taking care of you isn’t a waste of time.”

“Sure. But I know it can’t be--be comfortable, for you, to have to carry me like this.”

“More uncomfortable for you, I imagine. Broken ankle, and all.”

Martin hesitates. “I just don’t want to… to make things harder for you.” 

“Martin,” Jon says, looking him in the eyes with a feverish intensity amplified by the presence of an actual fever, “your needs get to matter. You get to matter. Yes, the apocalypse is important. But it doesn’t mean you’re not.” Though Jon is sure he doesn’t fully believe him, Martin nods, blushing, which is, at least, a step in the right direction. “And besides. You’re always… looking after me. It’s nice to get to take care of you, for once.”

The words, like all the rest have, feel clumsy as they come out of his mouth, and his stomach sinks when Martin looks a bit taken aback. 

“Oh,” Martin fumbles awkwardly, “I’m. Alright. Thank you.” 

Jon curses himself internally. It was the wrong thing to say, damn it, and now Martin probably thinks Jon is happy he’s injured just so he can feel useful; like he caused the apocalypse but, what, he’s nice to his boyfriend sometimes, so that doesn’t matter anymore? Beholding whispers again; God, he’s so cold; is his temperature really that high? He’d made it sound like he wanted Martin to need him so that he can feel less guilty about ruining the literal entire world, and damn it, and it’s not even like he’s really taking care of him--he’s hardly able to do anything. Can’t take the pain away, can’t drive him to hospital because he broke all the bloody hospitals, can’t even concentrate enough to say anything comforting to take his mind off it. 

“Doing alright, Jon?” Martin asks, because apparently he’s been silently spiralling for a while. Oh, and his eyes might have teared up, too, but he doesn’t think Martin has noticed that yet. Jon wants to be chatty, wants to set Martin’s mind at ease by rambling about something he’d read lately or even just commenting on the scenery. However, he’s relatively sure that if he puts any less than all of his focus into just getting one foot in front of the other, he’s going to trip, or faint, maybe, so he’s prioritizing. 

“Yes,” he replies, but there’s been a beat, and Martin isn’t convinced. 

“We can have a rest, if you need.”

“I’m fine.” 

“You’re quiet.” 

“Focusing.” 

“On what? Walking?” Jon blinks. His vision is beginning to sparkle a bit, and he’s not sure why. 

“I didn’t mean I’m glad you’re hurt,” he blurts, and Martin frowns. 

“What? Why would I think you were glad I was hurt?”

“When I said it’s nice to… take care of you,” he replies. “Didn’t mean it--that way.” 

Martin’s face is a mixture of anxiety and confusion. “Of course not,” he says. “I never thought you did?” Jon shivers. “You need to sit down. What’s wrong?”

“Perhaps a—sorry, sorry,” he stumbles dizzily, muttering a slurred apology when the motion forces Martin to put pressure on his bad leg, and he cries out in both pain and surprise, “--a short rest.” His vision has fully blackened, now, and the last thing he’s aware of is Martin’s hands worriedly helping to break his fall as he collapses. 

When Jon comes to, he’s lying on his back with Martin sat behind him, running a hand through his hair. He groans as he blinks awake, the headache returning with a vengeance. Consciousness is, as always, underwhelming. 

“Jon?” Martin calls. “Are you with me, now?” 

Jon nods. “Sorry,” he replies, “I just… got a bit dizzy. I’m fine.” 

“You’re absolutely not fine,” Martin snaps. “You’re running a fever, a really bad one--why didn’t I know you had a high bloody fever?--and you’ve been pushing yourself carrying me for the past--God, I don’t even know how long it’s been.” 

“What other choice did we have?”

Martin scoffs. “You’re seriously asking?” he demands. “You should have told me you were ill. And burning up. And in pain. That way, I could have given you water, and made sure you were resting often, and sure, it might have taken longer, but maybe you wouldn’t have  _ fainted _ , or if you had, then I’d have at least  _ known _ what’d happened, rather than having to figure it out alone!” Jon feels small as he nods. “You’re not my boss anymore, Jon; you don’t get to just not tell me things because you don’t think I can handle them.”

Jon shakes his head and sits up, which makes him realize how dizzy he is. He closes his eyes to block out the spinning. 

“It’s not that,” Jon argues. “I know you can handle it.” 

He knows Martin wants to push this argument further, to get the answers he deserves. But he reaches forward and presses his hand to Jon’s forehead, looking troubled, and exhales his frustrations. Jon can see them, all the things Martin doesn’t say, mist that doesn’t quite evaporate. Problems that don’t truly go away just because he stops talking about them and loneliness that doesn’t truly go away just because Jon promises to stay. 

“I can see the safehouse from here. We’re close. Do you think you can make it? Think about it before you answer.” 

Jon does. “I think, if I have some water.” 

Martin nods and fishes around in the bag for a bottle of water, which he passes to Jon. He doesn’t open his eyes while he sips from it slowly. God, he’s still so dizzy, and the sun is far too bright. 

After being gently pushed back down the first time he tries to get up, Jon’s second attempt is allowed. With Martin’s help, he stands, dizzy but steady enough to get them the rest of the way to the safehouse. 

Martin has no other choice but to lean heavily against him, and Jon knows he feels guilty about it, even guiltier than he had when he’d just thought it an inconvenience. He decides to beat Martin to the punch by apologizing first. 

“I should have been honest with you,” he says, and Martin sets his jaw squarely. 

“Yes,” he agrees sharply. “You should have.”

“I wasn’t… trying to keep it from you,” he tries, and when Martin rolls his eyes, he amends: “not at first. I was trying to stay positive and not think about it, at first.” 

“And later?” 

Jon sighs. “I was worried,” he says. “‘Cause you were hurt. That… that you wouldn’t, erm, let me help.” 

“Jon?” 

“Sorry, I’m—a bit dizzy again—can we—?” 

“Yes, yes, of course,” Martin reassures, helping to ease Jon to the ground so he can sit with his head between his knees. They’re only two or three minutes from the safehouse, now. When he presses his hand to Jon’s back, lightly rubbing circles to comfort him even if it’s only marginally, Martin grimaces at the heat pouring off him in thick, heavy waves. “God, that’s awful. I hate that I’ve got to push you so hard when you’re feeling like this.” 

Jon shrugs, his vision having steadied a bit now that he’s taken a few more sips from the water bottle. “It’s not far, now,” he says in lieu of a reply. “I’ll be alright in a moment.” 

Martin once again swallows a reply, Jon can feel it in the way his hand hesitates nearly imperceptibly on his back. 

“I trust you, Martin. I’m just… not very good at it.” 

“Then you need to work on it.” 

Jon nods. “I will. I am.” 

After a beat, Martin sighs. “I can’t say I blame you for not mentioning anything after I fell. I understand where you’re coming from. Believe me, I do. That’s why it scares me. This… instinct, I guess, that you’ve got, to handle everything for the people you care about, to ignore your own needs in favor of everyone else’s, to pretend that you don’t… That you’re, I don’t know, that you matter less… How do you think the Lonely claimed me so easily?” 

Jon’s eyes snap open at that, and despite the vertigo, he scoots forward to face Martin and grab both hands tightly. “Oh, Martin, Jesus, I didn’t even—I wasn’t—”

“I know. Look, we can talk about this later, alright? I’m not mad. I just want to get back to the safehouse. We both need to rest. Can you stand yet?” 

“Yeah,” Jon promises, and then he proves it.

By the time they arrive back at the safehouse, Jon barely has time to let Martin steady himself in the doorway before he collapses, half on the porch and half in the foyer. Martin is only able to keep his head from smacking into the ground by grabbing his shirt by the shoulders, and even then, it’s not a graceful descent. 

“Shit, shit, shitshitshit,” Martin whispers as he tries and fails to wake Jon with gentle taps to his cheeks. He kneels for stability, then drags Jon the rest of the way into the house. Using furniture and the wall to balance himself, he hops to the sink and wets a kitchen towel with cool water, then wrings it out and places it across Jon’s forehead. 

He’ll have to be lucid enough, soon, to splint Martin’s ankle so it can heal properly, he knows. 

At least the house’s windows are doing a good job keeping out the fog from outside. They might get out of this, after all. 


End file.
